"A Troper's Tales"

Shouting Match

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"Kratos, what are you doing?!" Lloyd shouted with a snarl at Kratos, who stood imperiously above them. Kratos remained silent and let his eyes drift elsewhere. "Answer me!" Lloyd insisted.

Kratos sighed and placed his hand on his forehead. "Very well." he said, unveiling his wings. "I am one of the Four Seraphim of Cruxis, sent to guide the Chosen on their journey to prevent them from straying." he said, ignoring the gasps and stares from the rest of the party. "Now, I suppose-" he stopped speaking when he heard someone walking up behind him.

"Kratos, what the hell do you think you're doing?" Yggdrasil asked as he stopped next to Kratos, a twisted smile on his face. "I thought you told me that you were going to expose something big. I hurried just to hear it."

Kratos twisted his face. "I don't understand what you are talking about Lord Yggdrasill," he said, folding his arms over his chest. "I thought you were coming down because you wanted to reveal that you're the big bad." Both angelic beings ignored the shocked gasps that came from the group below.

Yggdrasill's face scrunched up in fury at the same time as his mouth fell agape. "No fair, Kratos! I wanted to reveal that!" he cried. The not-so-benevolent dictator pointed to his outfit. "I even wore my best spandex outfit for the occasion!" Yggdrasill huffed and turned away, his mouth in the most grotesque grimace anyone in the group had ever seen before. That grimace was interrupted by a smirk that pulled Yggdrasill's lips. "Not my fault that you lied through your teeth with just about everything," he spat over his shoulder, "especially to a certain someone."

Kratos' eyes narrowed. "Yggdrasill, I wanted to expose that, thank you very much," he said. While Kratos was boiling inside, he was also awash with secret relief from not having a certain other secret exposed.

"Oh, so now it's back to Yggdrasill. You're going to betray me again?!" Yggdrasill pointed his finger accusingly at Kratos. "It's just like before! The cake is a lie!"

"You've been playing that game again, haven't you, Mithos?" asked Kratos. He folded his arms and gave Mithos the look he would give Lloyd when he had misbehaved fourteen years earlier. Mithos seemed to shrink into himself slightly before he straightened up with a gasped.

"You used my real name!" Mithos cried. "I wanted to reveal that too! You… you four thousand year old caveman!" Kratos clenched his fists as a low growl escaped past his lips. "See! Caveman!"

"What... is going on?" Sheena asked as she took a step backwards from the incredulous scene unfolding before her. Kratos and Mithos continued to yell with one of their fingers always pointing at the other.

"I don't think I want to know…" Raine said. With a bewildered sigh, she covered her eyes with her hand. "These two obviously have problems. Tell me again, Lloyd, why did you look up to Kratos?"

Lloyd weakly rubbed the back of his head. "Well… his swordsmanship… And he always made me happy… for some reason." He laughed weakly as Kratos and Yggdrasill continued to argue.

"Well at least I'm not some childish dictator prancing around in a skin tight leotard," Kratos shot back. "And I didn't spend four thousand years trying to revive my dead sister, old man."

Mithos paled. "Oh no, you didn't," he rasped. "Tell me you didn't just reveal the entire plot behind this game AND call me an old man. You… you… You're the one who ran away with that filthy human and spawned that!" Mithos pointed at Lloyd. Lloyd's head swerved back and forth between the two angels.

"Mithos… don't say another word," Kratos growled.

"Why don't you tell him, caveman!" Mithos goaded. "Tell the village idiot why he's an orphan."

Lloyd snapped his head to first look at Mithos, and then at Kratos. He did this several times until his neck hurt to move. Kratos hadn't moved from his position but the color did slowly drain from his face. A vile and victorious grin plastered itself onto Mithos.

"Kratos," Lloyd said, his voice ragged and stuffed full of unintelligible emotion. "What's he talking about… who are you?!"

"It's nothing you need to worry about, Lloyd." Kratos said as he continued to growl. Yggdrasill simply smirked and stuck his tongue out.

"You were lying to us and even betrayed us! Why are you getting all chummy now?!" Lloyd shouted as he scaled the stairs two at a time. He stopped just behind the auburn haired angel. "I want to know now!"

"You heard the boy, Kratos, tell him!" Yggdrasill crowed. "Stop being such a caveman for once! Especially after what you did to his mother-" Yggdrasil stopped speaking and jumped back when Kratos took a swipe at him with his sword. Kratos snarled as he missed the fruity angel.

"I'm so betraying you for this," Kratos said with a huff and angrily sheathed his sword. So hard was the force of the sheathing that the scabbard and the belt dropped a couple inches. Kratos turned to the boy behind him and said, "I'm with you again, Lloyd."

"I knew it!" Yggdrasill shouted. "After you called me Yggdrasill without the lord bit, I knew you would!" Yggdrasill started to grit his teeth as a guttural sound wafted past his pearly whites. He tried to stare a hole into Lloyd, who was still in shock. He smirked as an idea popped into his head. Yes, revenge would be his! "Yes, shocking, isn't it, Lloyd? He totally did stuff to your mother-."

"Mithos!" Kratos shouted. He turned and found the flaming dictator cracking up with a hand over his mouth and the other wrapped round his midsection as he tried to hold in the mirth wracking his form. A metal scraping pulled Kratos back around to face Lloyd.

"Kratos! What did you do to my Mom?!" Lloyd asked as he finished unsheathing his swords. He pointed one at Kratos and the other was halfway across the floor with a demon fang ready to fire off. Kratos easily stepped to the side and watched as the Demon Fang passed by him.

"Isn't it obvious?!" Mithos barked. "You're his pawn!" Mithos pointed at Kratos and burst out laughing. He paused after a second and said, "Wait, wrong word. I mean spawn! You're his spawn!" Again, he wrapped his arms around his torso fell to the floor to roll around while he laughed.

"What…?" Lloyd asked. "I'm his spawn? What's that supposed to mean?" Lloyd arched his eyebrow and looked to Kratos. Kratos quickly pounced on Yggdrasill. With the fairy's neck in his hands, Kratos began to throttle him. However, he stopped when he realized that Yggdrasill did not need to breathe. "Kratos…" Lloyd said, "are you saying…? Tell me what he's talking about! Please!" Lloyd pleaded.

"F-Fine…" Kratos said. His arms fell slack and Yggdrasill fell to the floor where he picked up his mirthful exhibit once more. Kratos turned and walked up to Lloyd. He placed a heavy pair of hands onto the boy's shoulders and said, "Lloyd." Looking deeply into his eyes, Kratos said, "I am your father."

Lloyd's knees both shook as he slumped to the floor. His mouth gapped open and closed several time as his eyes grew wide with the effort to calculate what exactly he'd just been told. Kratos stooped down, afraid the boy's eyes would pop out of his skull.

Lloyd's swords fell to the ground with a loud clatter. His head was thrown to the sky as he threaded his fingers through his brown locks and pulled as hard as he could. "Nooooo!" he wailed. His voice echoed throughout the tower. So loud was the soul shattering peal of despair that Welgaia's radar registered it was an above ground earthquake, which did not make sense because Welgaia was a floating city. So the angels simply exploded in the sheer awe of the supposed earthquake.

And Kratos and Mithos fainted from the sheer pain of the shriek, blood oozing out of their ears.

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Sagen: This is a partner project between V and me. We, as well as the other members of Sno Phoenix, do not own ToS or its characters, or the tropes we will be using throughout the fic. Review if you want – SP members can too, since you guys won't be seeing this until it's posted and is just between V and me. n.n

V: Review if you want. Won't hold it against if not. Hope you laughed.